Neat Little Bookshop customer, Grant, holds a corrugated shipping parcel obviously protecting a prized volume. Meanwhile, he hands me a burned copy of Mrs. John Graves Simcoe's Diary. I have read this diary - a captivating record of the challenges facing early pioneers in Upper Canada. My worn paperback is at home somewhere.
Have books ever had so many lives? Grant holds a neatly bound, be it sterile, hard-cover, scanned copy of Elizabeth Simcoe's diary. He researched, sent away his money and received this newly-bound book. Approx. $35. During his research, he discovered a free download of this treasured volume in the Toronto University Library. Burned to CD for the L'l Bookshop!
http://www.archive.org/details/diaryofmrsjohngr00simcuoft
Readers expect a book worthy of reading to be reprinted, by more-than-one publisher, over the decades. However, today, a book can be scanned, printed, burned to disc, viewed in what was at one time unimagined technologies.
Tomorrow: Thoughts on the future of books. Tell us your thoughts. lwalker@mountaincable.net
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
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